When The Bird Leaves The Nest

There comes a time in your life when you have to start making your own decisions. You have to be confident in them, confident that you’re capable of making logical decisions and overall utilizing your own discernment.

Coming from a late night, I boarded my solo flight, took my seat and began to reflect on my capability of making decisions and the recent disagreement I had with my mom.

Last year I was inspired and encouraged by one of my professors to apply for Alternative Breaks (AB). AB is a program provided by LMU where they select a group of students to travel to various counties/countries in hopes of fighting one common goal — social justice. I quickly became interested and applied to become a group leader for the Mental Health trip. My good friend Lila and I applied, had our interviews and waited for the verdict. We knew that there could only be one leader, but we promised each other that we’d still participate no matter who got the position. Fast-forward a couple of months later many things were going on in the world from the continuous Police brutality resulting in the killings of my people, to terrorist attacks in my beloved Paris, Brussels, and beyond (…sadly things are still occurring).

My mom and I went back and forth for what seemed like forever about whether or not I should go. Her argument – the world isn’t a safe place right now and I don’t think it’s a good idea. I told her the world was never a safe place to begin with and that I couldn’t live my life in fear. This went on literally up until the night of the trip. We prayed on it. My Gran slipped me some dollas and helped fund the last portion of my trip. I assured myself that I wasn’t going alone, I had my sistafriend Lila and both of our moms were depending on us to keep each other safe. My mom and I agreed to disagree and I was on my way to Granada, Nicaragua. Little did I know that the experience would change my life forever. I’ve had a few life changing experiences thus far, but the ones that stick with me the most are when I’m participating in acts of service.

That was the first time in my life, where I made a decision without my mom’s consent. Usually if she says no, then I’m like … well I’m not going. Yet this time something was different. I’m not gonna lie, some days I still battled with myself on whether or not I was making the right decision, but somewhere along the constant tug of those feelings … I actually became comfortable with my choice. It was freeing in a sense, and I couldn’t be happier now by following my hearts desire.

All in all, the trip was pretty amazing! I wish I would’ve kept a journal the entire trip. There were so many emotions, plenty of tears, and lessons learned. Here’s a snippet of a gentle reminder that I wrote in my phone near the end.

You never really know how good it feels to detach from the social world and live truly in the moment. I logged onto the homestay WiFi briefly to send a quick message to my loved ones and I was overwhelmingly bombarded with messages. Messages came in on all social platforms – email, text, FB, IG, and the list goes on. My phone vibrated back to back for a good 10 mins, it wouldn’t stop. I immediately turned off the WiFi signal. I like living simply. Honestly I feel like you can appreciate life a little more. Tonight, the girls and I sat on our balcony and star gazed. It was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. God is so real! Only He can cultivate something of that magnitude. We gazed up in awe as we argued over the meaning behind stars and which star line was the big dipper. Then we saw a shooting star flash across the sky. We all screamed in unison! We never have the chance to see such things back home due to pollution. The little things truly matter.
– 5/13/16

Gentle reminder: You have to live your life, for you

P.S. Thanks to everyone who listened to my rants during this time lol, yall really helped me  🙂

❤